Stuck in a Control Loop.
Recently I found myself stuck in struggling with world events I have no ability to change or influence.
I felt my anxiety escalating, and right when I put my hand to my heart to calm my nervous system, a book title popped into my head. Something I read over a decade ago.
I call this a book vision. When a book inserts itself in my thoughts I trust that it’s showing up for a reason.
So I meandered to my bookshelf to see what The Little Book of Letting Go by Hugh Prather had to say to my hurting heart. I smiled, remembering how it brought me comfort during a really difficult time as a stressed-out 29 year-old feeling the impending passage into my thirties, while also feeling I was perpetually living a life devoid of meaning, spirit, or purpose.
It took only a second of thumbing through the pages to remind myself why I loved this book.
According to Hugh Prather, there are three easy steps to letting go of that which we cannot control. (The need for control, something many Highly Sensitive People struggle with, is a byproduct of anxiety and overwhelm, something I have always historically struggled with.)
Three Steps to Letting Go:
1.) To remove what obstructs your experience of wholeness and peace, you must first look at the obstruction.
My true obstruction was overwhelm.
I was stressed out due to a seemingly impossible number of deadlines all coming to a head. So I put the book down, went to my to-do board, and began purging all of the “stressors” competing for my attention. I omitted everything without a deadline, because sometimes you just have to ignore the dust, the dog hair, and the accumulating laundry. After including everything I could think of, I found that the simple act of seeing the entire blockage in writing helped release much of the pent-up energy. Suddenly I found myself moving beyond catastrophizing (I have too much to do…and look at the state of this world!) into organized thought. (First this, then that, then this…one step at a time.)
This brought me to the second step, which was:
2.) To go beyond the obstruction, you must be certain that you want to.
In other words, did I truly want peace? Or was I thriving on chaos & catastrophe? That question isn’t as silly as it sounds. We do get stuck in mindsets, and our brain can become habitually accustomed to the neurotransmitters of that state of being. It’s possible to crave states of mind without even knowing it. (Two great titles on this topic are The Biology of Belief by Bruce Lipton, and The Molecules of Emotion by Candace Pert. These are not affiliate links; I just think they’re great books.)
After taking an honest evaluation, I knew I truly wanted peace. I wanted inner and outer peace, but shifting out of catastrophizing allowed me to see the truth–my sphere of influence only extends as far as my inner peace can reach. I can influence the outer world with my inner peace, but I will never be able to control the state of the world.
And the final step:
3.) To experience your wholeness, you must respond from your whole mind and not from your conflicted mind.
This means responding from that place where we feel a quiet and loving connection to all people and all things. Our higher consciousness, our sacredness. A place free from the tumultuous waters of our ego storms (reactivity from our inner wounds). We can’t build anything from a crumbling foundation of possible outcomes, fictional worries, and the mad desire to control unseen forces.
It’s not about perfection.
This may seem a lot easier said than done, right?
All we can do is start right now, from this place we stand, and do the best we can. The more we practice new ways of thinking and being, the better our brain becomes at building new pathways that support us rather than keep us stuck.
Welcoming in the new means letting go of our past habits that have only served to keep us caged.
After flipping through this classic on my bookshelf, I was reminded of a very important knowing. Spiritual comfort and psychological ease is never free. It’s not bestowed upon us with no effort invested. In my own life, every time I inadvertently settle into a place of too-much distraction or apathy, where tranquility is taken for granted, I suffer for it.
All It takes is a little intention, a little structure, to get back on track.
Much Love,
Kristy Sweetland
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